A Dream of Dragons
by dancewithdragons
Summary: A story in which Daenerys birthed twins, and her daughter survived. Wildly AU. (Rated T, may change to M as the story progresses) On hiatus.


**Prologue**

She'd been sick for so long, dreaming of fire and death and dragons. "_Don't want to wake the dragon do you?_" The voice was menacing, slick with anger, and when Daenerys had first woken, she'd tasted ashes in her dry, dry mouth. She'd only been awake long enough to ask for a dragon's egg the second time she woke, and the third she'd opened her eyes to find the egg nuzzled between her stomach and bosom.

It was the pale egg, with scales of cream and whorls of bronze and gold, and Dany could feel the heat it embodied. Once she would have been scared to feel the heat of the petrified egg. Once she would have cowered at the dragondew that made her body slick underneath her bedsilks. _No longer_, she thought as she peered around the tent. She wasn't the same timid girl of thirteen that she was when she married the _khal_; now she was the _Khaleesi_, a Queen, and the last dragon.

She was momentarily dizzy, and the throbbing between her thighs was intense, yet she felt strong. "Water," She told her handmaids, who had come running at the sound of her voice. "a flagon of water, cold as you can find it. And fruit, I think. Dates."

"As you say, _Khaleesi_."

"I want Ser Jorah," She said, gathering her strength and standing. A sandsilk robe was wrapped over her shoulders by Jhiqui, and she nodded in thanks. "And a warm bath, and Mirri Maz Duur, and..." Her mind was a flood of memories then, and she bit her lip, looking down before meeting the eyes of her maids. "Khal Drogo," She forced out, "Is he-?"

It was Irri who answered, her voice soft, like a whisper. "The _khal_ lives," She said, and Dany noticed the darkness in her eyes, raising a silver brow as the maid turned on her heel and left to fetch water as soon as she was finished speaking.

"Tell me," She insisted, turning to Doreah.

The Lysene girl looked down, shielding her pretty blue eyes with her pale blonde hair as she bowed her head, "I... I shall bring Ser Jorah," She murmured as she fled the tent.

Jhiqui looked like she was going to bolt from the tent as well, but Dany's hand snatched out and she caught the girl by the wrist before she could escape, narrowing her eyes of lilac. "What is it? I must know. Drogo... and my child." The last words came out quietly; why had she not remembered her child until now? "My son... Rhaego... where is he? I want him."

Her handmaid lowered her eyes as Doreah had before she ran from the tent, speaking as softly as she possibly could, though Dany heard the fear in her voice. "The boy... he did not live, _Khaleesi_."

_My son is dead_, she thought as she released the maid's wrist. Jhiqui left promptly, and Dany stood there, blinking slowly. She had known somehow; since she'd first awoken to Jhiqui's tears. No, she had known _before_ she woke, she realized, her dreams coming back to her suddenly. She remembered the man, tall with skin of copper, and a long silver-gold braid, bursting into flame.

She should weep, she wanted to weep, but she'd let out her tears in her dream. She could still fell them as they turned to steam on her cheeks. _All the grief has been burned out of me_, she allowed herself to believe. She was sad, still, but even with the emotion tickling at her heart, she felt her son recoiling from her, receding, as if he had never been.

Dany had moved to the dragon's eggs by the time that Ser Jorah and Mirri Maz Duur entered the tent. The two were still in her chest, black and emerald, and they felt just as hot as the cream one she'd curled herself around. _Strange_, she thought, more calm than she knew. "Ser Jorah," She said, "Come here." He strode to her, and she grabbed his hand, placing it on the egg of onyx coloring with the scarlet swirls. "What do you feel?"

Jorah was wary. "Shell, hard as rock. Scales."

"Heat?"

He shook his head, taking his hand away. "No. Cold stone... Princess, are you well? Should you be up, weak as you are?"

"Weak? I am strong, Jorah." She reclined on a pile of plush cushions to appease him. "Tell me how my child died."

"He never lived, my princess." The knight sighed, eyes moving to anything that wasn't Daenerys. He seemed to lighten up immediately after, though, his face suddenly a beacon, "Your daughter lives, though."

Dany tensed. Daughter? She'd only ever felt one babe, the Crones had only ever prophesied one babe. Her pale hand flew to her stomach and clutched it instinctively, Targaryen eyes flashing to the Westrosi. "What daughter? I have only a son, and he is dead."

Mirri Maz Duur came forward then, "Your son was monstrous, twisted. I drew him forth myself. He was scaled like a lizard, blind, with the stub of a tail and small leather wings, like the wings of a bat. When I touched him, the flesh sloughed off the bone, and inside he was full of graveworms and the stink of corruption. He had been dead for years."

Dany felt sick, though mostly confused. "And my daughter? How is it that my son died and my daughter lives?" She sat up on the pillows and folded her arms over her stomach completely, wincing as the pain between her thighs rumbled.

"After your son was pulled from you, and you still screamed, I feared you were dying. But when I turned, I could see the head of another babe crowning. She was so small, _Khaleesi_. She still is. Only the gods may know how she lived in the shadow of her brother in your womb, so well guarded, so protected from the magic." The _maegi_ relived the moment, gesturing with her hands and sighing at the end.

Dumbstruck, Dany shook her head. "But my son was alive and strong when Ser Jorah carried me into this tent," She murmured, holding her stomach tighter. "I could feel him kicking, fighting to be born."

"The creature that was your son came forth from your womb as I said." Said the woman, "It was not your son that kicked,_ Khaleesi_," Mirri Maz Duur lifted her arm in the direction of the tent's entrance, and Jhiqui, Doreah, and Irri entered all at the same time. Doreah was carrying a silver platter with dates, Irri a matching pitcher spilling with water and a chalice, and Jhiqui a bundle wrapped in sandsilks the same color as Dany's eyes.

"Bring her," Commanded the _Khaleesi_, opening her arms and blinking quickly to fight back tears. _My son is gone in the place of my daughter_, she thought as the Dothraki maid neared, gently placing the babe in her waiting arms.

"My daughter," she murmured, holding her at a distance. It all seemed too cruel; the gods giving her a son only to protect her daughter- a girl who could not command a _khalasar_ or take her home to Westeros or be the Prince who was Promised- from the _maegi's_ magic. "My daughter," she said again.

It felt odd to call the babe in her arms 'daughter', as Dany had only ever known her son, her son of copper skin, as tall and fierce as Drogo, but there was no denying that this was indeed her child. The babe was asleep, so Dany couldn't see the color of her eyes, but they were almond-shaped, like Drogo's. She had skin of milk, creamy and soft and porcelain, with hair of silver-gold already in a thick mass of curls atop her head. She was not the son that Daenerys had dreamed of. She was not copper skinned, she did not have any Dothraki in her aside from her eye shape, as far as the_ Khaleesi_ could tell, and yet it was not resentment that she felt for the sleeping babe in her arms, who yawned and curled closer to her mother's bosom, it wasn't anything like that at all.

"She's... so small." Whispered Dany as she toyed with one of her daughter's silver curls, eying her warily. The babe was only half the size she expected Rhaego to be, seeming more a doll than a baby.

"The babe is strong," Came Ser Jorah's scratchy voice, and it was then that she got a real look at the knight. He was grey faced, with hollow eyes and a limp about him. Dany knew he'd killed her son by taking her into the tent, the tent with the shadows on the walls, but she still had a child. She had her daughter. "She refuses to die, even in the heat and with minimal milk to suckle."

_The heat_? She couldn't feel any heat, in fact, it felt cool to Dany as she slid the babe back into Jhiqui's arms. She turned to Mirri Maz Duur, who stared at the child in awe, as though she were gods-sent. "You warned me that only death could pay for life. I thought you meant the horse."

"No," Mirri Maz Duur said, "That was a lie you told yourself. You knew the price."

Had she? Had she? Dany shook her head, silver-gold locks swaying like silk. "The price was paid," _If I look back I am lost_, she thought, trying to keep the edge in her voice. "The horse, my _son_, Quaro and Qotho, Haggo and Cohollo. The price was paid and paid and paid." Rising from her cushions, Dany balled her fists, eyes narrowing. "Where is Khal Drogo? Show him to me, godswife, _maegi_, bloodmage, whatever you are. Show me Khal Drogo. Show me what I bought with my son's life."

"As you command,_ Khaleesi_," The old woman said, "Come, I will take you to him."

Dany felt her knees shake, both from the weakness that crept back into her bones as the _maegi_ passed by her, and from the anger she felt bubbling in the pit of her stomach, and Ser Jorah slipped his arm around her to helped her stand. "Time enough for this later, my princess," said the knight.

"I would see him now, Ser Jorah."

Having been in the dimlit tent for so long, stepping outside and feeling, _seeing_, the sunshine was too much. She'd known she'd been sick for long, but _how_ long? The sun burned like the molten gold that had killed her brother, Viserys, and the land was barren. Her handmaids Doreah and Irri waited with her dates and her water, Jhiqui following her with the babe secure in her arms, and Jhogo moved close to help Ser Jorah support her. Aggo and Rakharo stayed behind them with her maids.

With sunlight blaring over the pale sand, it was hard to see anything more than that, so she held her hand up to shield her eyes, much like the way that Jhiqui did for the babe. There were ashes from fire, few horses searching for bits of grass, and minimal tents and bedrolls. A dwindled group of children gathered and watched her, dark eyes even darker, and woman behind them worked on meaningless tasks, old men staring at the dusky blue sky, flat and cloudless. There were less there than before, that much was obvious when she fist laid eyes on the landscape ahead; where there were once forty thousand, there were now a hundred.

"Drogo's _khalasar_ is gone," she said.

"A_ khal_ who cannot ride is no _khal_," said Jhogo.

"The Dothraki only follow the strong," Ser Jorah commented. "I am sorry, my princess. There was no way to hold them. Ko Pono left first, naming himself Khal Pono, and many followed him. Jhaqo was not long to do the same. The rest slipped away night by night in large bands and small. There are a dozen new _khalasars_ on the Dothraki sea, where once there was only Drogo's."

"The old remain," Said Aggo. "The frightened, the weak, and the sick. And we who swore. We remain."

Behind them the sounds of a babe rang and Jhiqui apologized quickly, but Dany stopped and turned, shaking her head and insisting there was nothing to apologize for. "Give her to me," She commanded, holding her newly awoken daughter close, staring down at her in awe. Those were her eyes, Dany realized as she watched the babe reach her chubby fingers up and grip her locks of silver, those irises of lilac were Daenerys's. They were Viserys's. Her mother's, her father's. This babe was so Targaryen that she was startled. Everything down to the curve of her tiny nose was a match of Dany, everything but the shape of her bright eyes.

"They took Khal Drogo's herds, _Khaleesi," _Rakharo said as she stood, transfixed with watching her daughter. "We were too few to stop them. It is the right of the strong to take from the weak. They took many slaves as well, the _khal's_ and yours, yet they left some few."

"Eroeh?" asked Dany, remembering the frightened child she had saved outside the city of the Lamb Men, gently running a finger from her babe's cheek to it's chin, feeling a smile creep on her lips as it giggled, trills of honey-sweet laughter ringing in her ears.

"Mago seized her, who is Khal Jhaqo's bloodrider now." Jhogo said softly. "He mounted her high and low and gave her to his khal, and Jhaqo gave her to his other bloodriders. They were six. When they were done with her, they cut her throat."

"It was her fate, _Khaleesi_." said Aggo.

Dany curled her standing body over her daughter and narrowed her eyes. If anyone had dared touch her child in that way..."It was a cruel fate, yet not as cruel as Mago's will be. I promise you that, by the old gods and the new, by the lamb god and the horse god and every god that lives. I swear it by the Mother of Mountains and the Womb of the World. Before I am done with them, Mago and Ko Jhaqo will plead for the mercy they showed Eroeh."

The Dothraki all exchanged glances of uncertainty. "_Khaleesi_," Came Jhiqui's soft voice, speaking to her as if she were speaking to a babe not much older than the one that Dany held. "Jhaqo is a khal now, with twenty thousand riders at his back."

She lifted her head, holding the babe in her arms fiercely. "And I am Daenerys Stormborn, Daenerys of House Targaryen, of the blood of Aegon the Conqueror and Maegor the Cruel and the old Valyria before them. I am the dragon's daughter, and my daughter after me, and I swear to you, these men will die screaming. Now being me to Khal Drogo."

When they reached him, he was sitting on the russet colored earth, staring at the sun.

There were multitudes of bloodflies draping him, but he seemed unaware of their presence. Dany waved them away and knelt at his side, shifting her daughter- their daughter- so that if Drogo only looked down, he would see her. But he didn't look down, only stared straight ahead with glossy eyes, and Daenerys knew he was blind. She whispered to him, "Sun-and-stars, my sun-and-stars," But he kept looking on, deaf to her voice, deaf to anything. The cut on his breast was healed, as much as it ever would be, scarred and red and disgusting.

"Why is he out here alone, in the sun?" she asked them.

"He seems to like the warmth, Princess," Ser Jorah said. "His eyes follow the sun, though he does not see it. He can walk after a fashion. He will go where you lead him, but no further. He will eat if you put food in his mouth, drink if you dribble water on his lips."

Dany pursed her lips, kissing her husband's brow before rising, handing her daughter to Jhiqui and facing Mirri Maz Duur. "Your spells are costly, _maegi_."

"He lives," Mirri Maz Duur said, "You asked for life. You paid for life."

"This is not life, for one who was as Drogo was. His life was laughter, and meat roasting over a firepit, and a horse between his legs. His life was an _arakh_ in his hand and his bells ringing in his hair as he rode to meet an enemy. His life was his bloodriders, and me, and the son I was to give him. The daughter I gave him."

Mirri Maz Duur looked on.

"When will he be as he was?" Dany demanded, looking from her husband to her daughter and then at the _maegi_ again.

"When the sun rises in the west and sets in the east," Mirri Maz Duur said, "When the seas go dry and mountains blow away in the wind like leaves. When your womb quickens again, and you bear a living son, or another daughter. Then he will return, not before."

Dany gestured to Ser Jorah and the others, stepping close to press a gentle kiss on her child's forehead. "Leave us. I would speak with this_ maegi_ alone." When the knight and Dothraki left, she spoke again. "You knew," She accused. She was aching and tired and just wanted to hold her child, her only child, her daughter, but her fury gave her strength. "You knew what I was buying, and you knew the price, and yet you let me pay it."

"It was wrong of them to burn my temple," the heavy, flat-nosed woman said placidly. "That angered the Great Shepherd."

"This was no god's work," was Dany's chilling reply. "You cheated me. You murdered my child within me. You would have killed my daughter, had you known of her presence." _If I look back I am lost_.

"The stallion who mounts the world will burn no cities now. His _khalasar_ shall trample no nations into dust."

Dany fumed. "I spoke for you. I saved you."

"_Saved_ me?" Mirri Maz Duur spat. "Three riders had taken me, not as a man takes a woman but from behind, as a dog takes a bitch. The fourth was in me when you rode past. How did you save me? I saw my god's house burn, where I healed good men beyond counting. My home they burned as well, and in the street I saw piles of heads. I saw the head of a baker who made my bread. I saw the head of a boy I had saved from deadeye fever, only three moons past. I heard children crying as the riders drove them off with their whips. Tell me again what you saved."

"Your life."

The_ maegi_ laughed a cruel, masochistic laugh. "Look at your _khal_ and see what life is worth, when all the rest is gone."

"It is not all gone!" Dany hissed, pointing in the direction that Jhiqui took the Targaryen colored babe. Her babe. Drogo's babe. "He has a daughter. A wife. There are still people in his _khalasar_, and you dare stand there and tell me that all is gone from him?"

She called for the men of her khas and bid them take Mirri Maz Duur and bind her hand and foot, and as they did, the _maegi_ smiled at her. It was mocking and Dany felt disgusted, calling for Jhiqui. "My child," She demanded, holding her arms out and readily accepting the babe.

_All is not gone_, she reminded herself as she rocked the babe. _Life is worth nothing if all is gone, but all is not gone. _As much as Dany would have liked to cry at the sight of her husband being pulled up and blindly following the men of her _khas_, she couldn't feel the tears coming. He was not lost to her, she realized as she kissed their daughter on the brow. She had Drogo in the little bundle of silver curls and violet eyes she held in her arms.

"You are the blood of the dragon," She murmured to the tiny babe. "You are of the blood of Aegon the Conqueror and Maegor the Cruel and the old Valyria before them. You are the dragon's granddaughter, and you are a Princess of the Iron Throne." Daenerys looked to Ser Jorah, who eyed her sadly. He knew. They both knew. In this desert, a babe this size would never survive; she would die as her brother did before her, full of graveworms and smelling of corruption.

That night, before Dany went to Drogo for the last time, she sent for Ser Jorah.

"My daughter," She pursed her lips as she looked at the infant that lay sleeping on her freshly washed bedsilks, so plump, so innocent, so Targaryen. "Ser Jorah, you must save her. You must take her from here. I will not stand by and watch as my child, the only child I'll ever have, dies. As your _Khaleesi_, your Princess, your Queen, I beg you take her and keep her safe."

Ser Jorah had been touched by the shadows in the tent, just as her son had, but every time he looked on her daughter it was like he had seen a light from the gods. She trusted him with her as she would trust no other. "I cannot defy your wishes," Said the knight, stepping forward and wrapping his arms awkwardly around the babe, careful yet strong. "She needs a name." He murmured, and the baby rolled so she faced Daenerys, though her eyes were closed and she snored on.

Dany looked at her daughter for a long time, taking in the image of her. _She's so beautiful_, she thought as she touched her cheek softly with her palm, violet eyes meeting dark grey as she looked back up to Ser Jorah. _If I look back I am lost_. She said only one word before the knight took her daughter and left- A word of power, a word of hope and love. The name of a great Queen before her.

"Rhaenyra."

* * *

So, as you guys can tell, this is wildly and obscenely AU. It will take place about fifteen years after A Game of Thrones, and there will be some much loved pairings mentioned. (Well, much loved to me anyway.) I'm mostly following my own imagination with this, and I'm not sure how long it's going to last, but we'll see.  
Enjoy, and I hope to hear from you. :)


End file.
